Slavery paid for a substantial share of the capital, iron, and manufactured goods that laid the basis for American economic growth. In addition, because the South specialized in cotton production, the North developed a variety of businesses that provided services for the South, including textile factories, a meat processing industry, insurance companies, shippers, and cotton brokers. The economic engine of the slave trade helped to fuel America’s prosperity. The profits from the trade in enslaved people flowed to many places. Traders were not the only ones to profit from America’s internal slave trade. Slave owners in the Upper South profited because they received cash for the people they sold. Slave owners in the Lower South profited because the people they purchased were forced to labor in the immensely productive cotton and sugar fields. The merchants who supplied clothing and food to the slave traders profited, as did steamboat, railroad and ship owners who carried enslaved people. Slavery became one of the main reasons why the Civil War was started. Because of the uncompromising differences between the free and slave states over the power of the
Slavery paid for a substantial share of the capital, iron, and manufactured goods that laid the basis for American economic growth. In addition, because the South specialized in cotton production, the North developed a variety of businesses that provided services for the South, including textile factories, a meat processing industry, insurance companies, shippers, and cotton brokers. The economic engine of the slave trade helped to fuel America’s prosperity. The profits from the trade in enslaved people flowed to many places. Traders were not the only ones to profit from America’s internal slave trade. Slave owners in the Upper South profited because they received cash for the people they sold. Slave owners in the Lower South profited because the people they purchased were forced to labor in the immensely productive cotton and sugar fields. The merchants who supplied clothing and food to the slave traders profited, as did steamboat, railroad and ship owners who carried enslaved people. Slavery became one of the main reasons why the Civil War was started. Because of the uncompromising differences between the free and slave states over the power of the